American Essence

From Hero to Zero: America’s Most Infamous Traitor

In this installment of When Character Counted, we look at an American lionheart whose collapse of character, virtue, and honor ruined his reputation forever.
From Hero to Zero: America’s Most Infamous Traitor
Engraving depicting the treason of Benedict Arnold for changing sides during the American Revolutionary War, where Arnold persuades Andre to conceal the papers in his boot, 1779. Archive Photos/Getty Images
Jeff Minick
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Ford Madox Ford began his 1915 novel “The Good Soldier” with this line, “This is the saddest story I have ever heard.”

Though his life was a far cry from the plot of the novel, the saga of Benedict Arnold fits both the book’s title and that opening sentence. Arnold was not only a good soldier, but a brilliant one. Yet his downfall, which he brought on himself, is one of the saddest stories in the annals of American history.
Jeff Minick
Jeff Minick
Author
Jeff Minick has four children and a growing platoon of grandchildren. For 20 years, he taught history, literature, and Latin to seminars of homeschooling students in Asheville, N.C. He is the author of two novels, “Amanda Bell” and “Dust on Their Wings,” and two works of nonfiction, “Learning as I Go” and “Movies Make the Man.” Today, he lives and writes in Front Royal, Va.